[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 61 (Monday, April 3, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H4035]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                          BASEBALL STRIKE OVER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 1995, the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Durbin] is recognized 
during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. Speaker, I have two different messages this morning. 
First, let me say this.
  After months of interminable negotiations and public relations one-
upmanship, the baseball strike appears to finally be over. On both 
sides during the course of this strike we have seen our share of heroes 
and cads. May I, as a lifelong baseball fan, give the baseball owners 
and the players a word of advice?
  Your generation of owners and players has been entrusted with an 
American institution as venerable as any in our country. America has 
now endured this strike, the loss of a world series and threats of 
another lost season with amazing equanimity. Now please put this sad 
chapter in our Nation's history behind us and play ball.


                        tax cuts for the wealthy

  Now, let me switch to the political side, if I might, for a moment.
  The gentleman who spoke before me kicked off the week in a series of 
speeches which you will hear from both sides of the aisle about the so-
called Republican contract and the first 100 days of the 104th 
Congress. I have taken to this floor many times during the course of 
this debate on the Republican contract and for the most part have been 
critical of the proposals on the Republican side. I voted for a few. I 
voted against many more.
  But let me say at the outset that even though I disagree with many 
elements in the contract, I certainly disagree with the procedure by 
which it has been brought to the floor, I have viewed the last 95 days 
or so as exciting, interesting, and really one that has brought new 
enthusiasm to this House of Representatives and for that I would like 
to salute the Republican leadership. They have brought to this floor 
ideas that have been debated.
  The reason I am in public life is because I like the battle of ideas. 
And, boy, we have sure had a lot of them on the floor over the last 
several weeks, and we are going to have a big one this week.
  In the last few months we have had suggestions from the Republican 
side to create orphanages. Now there was a concept people had not heard 
of in a long time. They finally gave up on that idea, but they kicked 
it around for a while.
  They had a proposal they did not give up on to cut the school lunch 
programs. Unfortunately, that is one that is going to have to be taken 
care of either by the Senate or the President.
  And now they are still working on the concept of cutting student 
loans for kids from middle-class families who want to go to college and 
trade school and improve their lives. I certainly hope my Republican 
friends have second thoughts about those.
  But the item for debate this week is one that has already been 
touched on and that is the so-called Republican tax cut package. Keep 
in mind, ladies and gentlemen, that every politician would love to 
stand before you in this well and back home and say, ladies and 
gentlemen, for this campaign, I present to you a tax cut. And, of 
course, the crowd will applaud. Everybody loves a tax cut.
  But, frankly, if you take a close look at this tax cut from the 
Republicans, it is a lot different story than it first appears.
  The gentleman who spoke a few minutes ago talked about the small-
change items in the tax bill that generally do benefit good people, 
senior citizens and working families and people who want to save for 
their futures. He overlooked the fact that 51 percent of the benefits 
of this tax bill do not go to those folks. They go to the wealthiest 
people in America. The privileged few are going to score again.
  And you know who is going to pay for it? Once again, working families 
all across this country. Because you cannot give a tax cut without 
paying for it. You are going to add to the deficit.
  So the Republicans want to add $178 billion to the deficit over the 
next 5 years and then over $400 billion in the 5 years following that. 
So it will cost us over $600 billion for this little tax cut deal.
  The last time we had a tax cut proposal this big was when President 
Ronald Reagan was in the White House. He said it was going to cure 
America's problems. We all know what we got for it, the biggest 
national debt in the history of the United States of America. It was a 
tax cut that did not work.
  And I am afraid this one is the same. Let me just give you one 
example.
  The Republicans eliminate what is called the
   alternative minimum tax. Now this is a tax on wealthy, profitable 
corporations in America which was imposed several years ago because we 
found out that some pretty smart lawyers and accountants had figured 
loopholes in the Tax Code, and many of the most profitable companies in 
America, billion dollar enterprises with millions of dollars of profit, 
were not putting a nickel in the Treasury. They took advantage of this 
wonderful economy and this system of government and did not pay a penny 
in taxes.

  We said, you know, whatever happens you have got to pay a minimum tax 
to really contribute to the growth in the country and to pay the bills.
  We put the alternative minimum taxes on the books. The corporations 
paid their taxes for 5 or 6 years. Along come my Republican friends, 
and they say, ``That is unfair. We want to get back to the old days 
when profitable big corporations would not pay any taxes, where they 
could get off the hook completely.''
  That does not make much sense because in order to give that break we 
have got to continue to cut important programs in education and 
nutrition.

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